Life Went On
by mashnut
Summary: Hawkeye and life after the war. But who is this all being told to?


Life Went On By mashnut

A M*A*S*H Fan Fic

I don't own the M*A*S*H characters. (There's a surprise!) I'll put then back. They might not be all in one piece but I'll put them back. This is an idea I had when I found out that there was supposedly a clause in Alan Alda's contract that said there had to be at least one scene in the O.R. in each episode, because he didn't want people to think war was just a joke, and the O.R. scenes showed what it was really like.

Maybe I should start at the beginning. I'm not sure where the beginning is but I think it was around the time when I got home from the Korean War. (Sorry, police action.) Margaret turned up out of the blue and we ended up staying together. I am after all Crabapple Cove's most handsome bachelor and there were rumours about us. I denied them all, Margaret Houlihan and I, Benjamin Franklin Pierce, are just friends. We have been since the M*A*S*H unit we served in. Maybe that's where it all started.

You see the thing is this war didn't just affect the people at the front line, it affected the people who patched up the wounded. That was the purpose of a M*A*S*H unit (Mobile Army Surgical Hospital) only three miles from the fighting, to fix and send on to an Evac. Hospital (Evacuation Hospital, it sent them either home or back to the front). I made some great friends there; "Trapper" John MacIntyre, Henry Blake (the first commanding officer), Sherman Potter (Henry's replacement), BJ Hunnicutt, Charles Emerson Winchester, Father Mulcahy, "Radar" O'Reilly, Maxwell Klinger and of course Margaret Houlihan. Trapper, Henry, Sherman, BJ, Charles and I were all surgeons, there was another surgeon called Frank Burns. Frank was a master at getting it wrong, including having an affair with Margaret that cost him his marriage. Margaret was head nurse.

But war, you see, left a mark on all of us. When Trapper went home after one year I thought he would be fine, that he would escape the horror and go home to his wife and children. He regressed to drink. "Trapper" John MacIntyre, my best friend, died of alcohol poisoning only a few months after the war ended.

Henry Blake was a good man who got caught up in the war like me and so many others. He got his orders to go home just before Trapper did. Only on the way, over the sea of Japan, his plane was shot down. Poor Radar (the company clerk at the time) had to break the news to us in a packed O.R.

Frank Burns actually went nuts when Margaret got married. I wonder if he ever found out about the subsequent divorce? The army caught him after he went on the rampage while on R&R in Tokyo. They sent him home and promoted him to Lieutenant Colonel. Nobody has heard from him since.

Radar, so called because he heard and saw things before anyone else, got to go home before the war ended. Radar is thought of as the best company clerk the 4077th ever had. His world was in triplicate, Iowa, farming, animals and the teddy bear he slept with. He idolised Henry as a father when he died, part of Radar died too. Trapper, BJ and I all treated Radar like a little brother. At least he finally found a girl, who loved him as much as we did, and settled down.

The rest of us saw out the end of the war. BJ came in as Trapper's replacement and Charles as Frank's. Charles was definitely the better surgeon. Radar was replaced (No, replaced is the wrong word. No-one could replace Radar. "Stood in for." That's it. It was just like Radar was on a really long spell of R&R.) by Klinger.

When wounded came we operated and when there was no wounded we spent our time in sometimes pointless pursuits. Most of us drank.

Henry kept a liquor cabinet in his office and Sherman was heard to say "I only drink in groups of one or more". Trapper and I were always after the driest martini.

"I thought this was supposed to make you feel good." Radar had a taste of the gin we produced in the still Trapper and I made.

"No, it's meant to make you feel nothing." BJ replied. Radar never drank, he always ordered Grape Nehi (soft drink). He had a really bad day when he turned up at the "Swamp" that night. I should explain that the tent that Trapper, BJ, Frank, Charles and I lived in was called the "Swamp" because it was such a mess all the time.

Sherman Potter painted pictures and looked after his horse, Sophie. Sherman was ex-cavalry and loved horses as much as his wife, Mildred. He served in both world wars as well as Korea. He slipped into retirement when the Korean War ended and died in his sleep at the ripe old age of 78.

You must have realised by now that I'm no spring chicken myself. It's been forty years since I said goodbye to the "Swamp". I never got married, hence the rumours when Margaret arrived and never left.

Margaret Houlihan spent most of her early life in the army. Mistakenly she and Frank got together. Till she broke it off when she announced her engagement to Donald Penobscott. The marriage turned sour and ended with divorce. I will admit that there is/was something between Margaret and I. We didn't act on it. About six months after the war ended Margaret turned up at my door in Crabapple Cove. Once her mother died, she left the army and found out it was hard to live as a civilian. At first she only wanted to stay with an old friend till she could live on her own. Except that Margaret never left. I loved the fact that she was willing to look after "a terminal bachelor".

I received some bad news about Maxwell Klinger a couple of days ago. He died under suspicious circumstances. I think the war got to him. Klinger tried to prove the whole time he was there that he was nuts. To gain a section eight discharge was his ultimate goal. He wore women's dresses, tried to eat a jeep, sat up a pole for three days and he even dressed up as the statue of liberty when General MacArthur came to visit. The funny thing is he stayed on after the war to try to find his Korean wife's family. 

There isn't a lot to say about Charles Winchester. He was Frank's replacement. BJ and I had a lot of fun driving him up the wall. Charles was always using his parents' money to get him out of the police action he got himself into.

Father Mulcahy stayed on after the war too. Padre, as he was also known, was a great man. He had this great ability to become anything that was needed; surgeon, psychologist and a minister for almost every faith. He stayed to help the many Korean orphans he had grown to love. He passed away three years ago leaving all of his money to those still helping in the orphanage he built almost entirely on his own.

But the most brilliant person I knew was BJ Hunnicutt. In a time when people were wrecking marriages and losing loved ones. BJ always stayed faithful to your mother and you. I remember him reciting the letters he got from home or sharing the latest culinary delight your mother had made. The argyle socks he never wore but always washed. They reminded him of better times. Times at home with you, Erin. I could go on for hours about him. But you will know him better than I ever did.

Erin, you asked for what went on over there and I've told you. Most of it you would have to have been seen. It is a truly honest account of the people and goings on during and after the Korean war at M*A*S*H 4077th. I hope this fills in the gaps that your dad never told you. The funeral usually gives some closure but there's this void that once was filled with BJ and the pain I felt when I heard that he had gone will be nothing to what you are experiencing. 

All my love and sympathy

Hawkeye

Benjamin Franklin Pierce MD


End file.
